NORTH West Warriors begin their defence of the Inter-provincial Twenty20 Trophy at Merrion tomorrow (5pm) knowing that defeat would almost certainly hand the title to Leinster Lightning!

This year's fixture list gave Lightning the first three fixtures and with home and away wins over Northern Knights already under their belts, a bonus point win tonight would put them in a virtually unassailable position at the top of the table.

Indeed, the only way Warriors could retain the title was if they won their three remaining games with bonus points. And a look at the respective strengths of the two teams makes Lightning hot favourites to complete a hat-trick of wins.

The hosts have made just one change to the team which hammered the Knights last Friday by 53 runs and they are strengthened by the return of batsman/wicket-keeper Fintan McAllister, in place of young Lorcan Tucker.

With no fewer than eight internationals, including last week's top scorer John Anderson, boosted by a return to the Ireland squad for next month's Intercontinental Cup match against UAE, they have twice as many as the Warriors who will again rely heavily on captain Andy McBrine, Stuart Thompson, Craig Young and Graeme McCarter.

A fifth international, Andy Britton, would have been included but for work commitments while Aaron Gillespie has an exam and William McClintock, who played in Sunday's 50-over defeat to the Knights at Coleraine is injured.

The two additions to Sunday's side are the recall of opening batsmen David Barr, who scored 86 for Bready in the Senior Cup last weekend, and Brigade's Ryan Hunter.

Spare a thought for Stuart Thompson who travels to Dublin tomorrow, returns to Eglinton for an Ulster Cup match on Saturday and then is at Downpatrick on Sunday for the start of Warriors' three-day game against the Knights.

Squads: Leinster Lightning: J Mooney (capt), J Anderson, A Cusack, K Carroll, E Delany, T Kane, F McAllister, A Poynter, E Richardson, M Sorensen, F Tucker, Yaqoob Ali

North West Warriors: A McBrine (capt), S Thompson, C Young, G McCarter, D Rankin, D Barr, C Averill, G McClintock, R Chopra, S Campbell, R Hunter, RL Dougherty